From “The Discourse of the Birds” by Sandra Cooke Jameson

“You mustn’t heed him,” said the crow. “His kind have a dour streak to them.”

“You know all too well of what I speak, corvid,” hissed the vulture. “You have taken of the dead just as I, I who have seen and feasted on death since my parents first bore it to me in the nest.”

“So what would you say, then?” I asked both birds.

“The world is cruel and there is no reason to it,” said the vulture. “I have seen the deserving young cut low, the revered aged slaughtered, and feasted on the eyes of those who wished only good for others and the world. Indifference is the way of our world, and indifference I cannot but share.”

“And you?” I asked the crow.

“Who cares?” it replied. “Stuff happens and there’s no reason to read anything into it. Sure, I’ll eat the dead if they’ll go to waste. But I’ll also eat a berry, and that doesn’t say anything about the world other than it’s juicy. Trying to read a philosophy out of what happens is like shouting at a rock. It might make you feel better, but the rock will do what it does and you only hurt yourself by worrying about it.”